5 Re Envisioning General Education Executive Summary On October 15, 2008, the committee received the charge from Provost Warwick Bayly to provide him with a set of recommendations by April 1, 2009 that will provide a basis for direction and strategy for general education at Washington State University. In carrying out this charge, he asked the committee to consider: Fresh possibilities for structuring general education, given current literature nationally on the topic and internal reviews of General Education issues Advantages and disadvantages of lessening the distinctions between general education and the major What the goals and pedagogical strategies should be for structuring general education in the transitional freshman year How to evaluate if students are learning what they need to, i.e., are they meeting the learning goals of General Education and the baccalaureate In subsequent informal conversations with some of the committee, the provost also requested consideration of how a general education program could foster leadership. The committee s understanding of its charge is to propose an overall concept and direction for the WSU general education program, not to develop a detailed plan. In this report, the committee offers a vision along with some recommendations for achieving that vision. Realizing that their task was a complex and multi layered one, the committee immediately began an intensive research period, developed a set of guiding principles, and carefully examined the current General Education program. In the end, the committee found that the program is, in fact, in need of a major redesign in light of realities and fundamental issues and concerns detailed in the report. These include an outdated budgeting system; widespread lack of knowledge about the nature, purpose, and structure of the program; and a fundamental shift in the design of educational programs nationally and internationally, to focus on outcomes (what students actually know and are able to do) rather than on course counting. GEVC advocates a vision of general education that supports the goals of WSU s strategic plan to provide a premier education and transformative experience that prepares students to excel in a global society by providing high impact learning experiences that engage students and by fostering core competencies in our learners. It is in line with a national consensus on General Education as embodied in the American Association of Colleges & Universities documents on liberal learning included in this report. The GEVC vision for General Education at WSU can be summarized as follows: 1

6 WSU fosters educational outcomes that include knowledge of human cultures, of the arts, and of the natural and physical world. Students develop their intellectual and practical skills through integrated learning experiences that prepare them to be responsible local and global citizens and leaders. They reach this through a broad liberal education, specialization in a major, and community and field based experiences that explore the world s major questions. The outcomes of a baccalaureate degree should be reached through coordinated and integrated pathways. Courses and experiences in the major and outside the major, elective and required, contribute to students achievement of outcomes. The re envisioning will only be complete when outcomes become embodied in curricula, and pathways emerge through general education and major requirements. Three fundamental issues must be addressed if changes to general education requirements or courses are to have meaning and impact. These are: 1. Budget reform as the sine qua non of general education reform. 2. Awareness, buy in and marketing of General Education to faculty and students. The committee recommendations for revision of program elements can be discussed as part of raising general awareness around the issue. They include: Make the General Education program simpler and more flexible Create coherent pathways through all four years and engage with the major Consider crediting co curricular learning Re examine first year and capstone experiences 3. Shifting to an outcomes driven paradigm. The committee s research into the experience of other universities that have successfully overhauled their general education programs shows that it is a multi year process. To assure faculty buy in and resolve potential conflicting needs, the committee recommends that during the academic year, some form of the current committee (with possible additions/changes) focus on two areas in particular: 1. Outreach to various constituencies to engage in dialogue regarding the report and its different elements. There needs to be frank and open conversations with Senate leadership; deans, associate deans, chairs and program directors, faculty; regional campuses; advisors; and students through ASWSU and other forums. 2. Outcomes are central to the restructuring of the General Education program. Faculty must be engaged from the beginning in the process of re examining the learning goals and 2

7 writing assessable outcomes for them. We need to engage faculty, the Teaching Academy, and experts from all campuses, AAC&U, and professional departments. This discussion will inevitably include consideration of potential changes to the program. The committee foresees a third year to continue dialogue with all of the constituent groups to finalize a new program, and a fourth year to begin implementation. Should consensus emerge more rapidly, this timeline could be accelerated. The committee stresses that a four year timeline is normal for an inclusive, faculty driven process. 3

8 General Education Visioning Committee REPORT Summary of charge to the committee On October 15, 2008, the committee received the charge from Provost Warwick Bayly to provide him with a set of recommendations by April 1, 2009 that will provide a basis for direction and strategy for general education at Washington State University (Appendix A). In carrying out this charge, he asked the committee to consider: Fresh possibilities for structuring general education, given current literature nationally on the topic and internal reviews of general education issues Advantages and disadvantages of lessening the distinctions between general education and the major What the goals and pedagogical strategies should be for structuring general education in the transitional freshman year How to evaluate if students are learning what they need to, i.e., are they meeting the learning goals of general education and the baccalaureate In subsequent informal conversations with some of the committee, the provost also requested consideration of how a general education program could foster leadership. The committee s understanding of its charge is to propose an overall concept and direction for the WSU general education program, not to develop a detailed plan. The committee wishes to emphasize that it is offering a vision, and some recommendations for achieving the vision. It very consciously and specifically has not crafted a done deal of line item changes to the current courses and requirements. In fact, the next steps in the process will require extensive dialogue among all faculty about what outcomes WSU wishes to set for its undergraduate degrees, and what curricula are appropriate to foster those outcomes. The committee members met twice monthly throughout the rest of the academic year, culminating in a daylong retreat on Thursday, May 14, 2009, to finalize the contents of this report. 4

9 General overview of the process and development of guiding principles The committee members quickly began to realize that their task was a complex and multilayered one affected by numerous factors, including: The Vancouver campus s experience in trying to develop a new general education program that ultimately was terminated after two years The Tri Cities campus s need to expand lower division offerings, including general education courses, now that it has become a four year campus The need to design a program for a state wide, multi campus system where campuses are vastly different in scale and in student/faculty demographics New regional accreditation guidelines on general education that mandate a general education program which demonstrates an integrated course of study that helps students develop the breadth and depth of intellect to become more effective learners and to prepare them for a productive life of work, citizenship, and personal fulfillment. Baccalaureate degree programs and transfer associate degree programs include a recognizable core of general education that represents an integration of basic knowledge and methodology of the humanities and fine arts, mathematical and natural sciences, and social sciences. A new (2008) university strategic plan that posits a goal of providing a premier education and transformative experience that prepares students to excel in a global society, with particular focus on providing high impact learning experiences that engage students and on fostering core competencies in our learners The move of the World Civilizations program to the Department of History The impact of the Academic Affairs Program Prioritization report (A2P2) The impact of budget reductions on courses and programs that affect the availability of general education courses An increasingly international faculty educated outside the American system and thus potentially unfamiliar with the notion of a broad liberal education as part of an undergraduate degree The burgeoning literature on the topic of general education, both national and international, that needed to be read to acquaint the committee with contemporary thinking on the subject The committee immediately began an intensive research period in which the members looked both inward and outward (see bibliography in Appendix F for an overview of this research). 5

10 Through this research, the committee found that the current General Education program is, in fact, in need of a major redesign in light of the realities noted above, and in light of three fundamental issues. Two of these issues have been identified in previous reports on general education; the third has emerged most pointedly with the imminent change in accreditation standards in the Northwest region. All must be addressed if any changes in requirements or curriculum are to be successfully implemented: An outdated budgeting system that is widely seen as a barrier to improvements at any level of the program; Widespread lack of knowledge or misunderstanding on the part of faculty, students, and staff of the nature, purpose, and structure of the general education program; A fundamental shift in the design of educational programs, both nationally and internationally, to focus on outcomes (what students actually know and are able to do) rather than on course counting. As the committee began to identify particular areas of concern, it also drew up a set of principles to guide the analysis of the problems and the formulation of possible solutions. Many of the principles characterize the current program, and are listed here to capture systematically elements needed for any future program. Whether old or new, implicit or explicit in the Pullman and Vancouver models, these guiding principles are that: A general education program has to work for all campuses: there should be only one program system wide, albeit with flexibility to adapt to the circumstances at different campuses. It must meet transfer student needs. Current goals of the baccalaureate are largely suitable as general educational goals but are open to refinement. A General Education program should be designed around learning outcomes, not around course counting or administrative structures of departments. General Education courses must be based on outcomes that link to undergraduate learning goals and are assessable; assessment must be pervasive through the general education structure. Broad based educational outcomes span general education and the majors, including professional and pre professional studies. All curricula help students achieve the outcomes of a liberal education. 6

11 There should be integration and coherence between general education and the major; general education requirements are not set apart over there with respect to the major. The program must demonstrate intellectual coherence; should intentionally develop intellectual skills through all four years; and be simple, compact and flexible, with fewer (e.g ) rather than more credits required. The program must provide for breadth of study as well as for integrative learning; consistent with program outcomes, some of the breadth should be at the upper division, and could be met in the major. The freshman year needs intentional design with common outcomes, bearing in mind residential and non residential characteristics of the campuses. Baccalaureate programs should culminate with an integrative capstone experience either in the major or in General Education. Finally, the committee s research, including the examination of the WSU Vancouver experience, made it clear to the members that there are numerous political and economic realities and concerns that need to be addressed if general education at WSU is to be successfully reenvisioned. The key points that emerged were: Any proposal will be both too radical and not radical enough. There has to be continual outreach and faculty development in order for a system of outcomes to be translated effectively into course design and assessment. A successful general education program requires permanent, stable funding and a mechanism to address enrollment increases in a predictable manner. The large undergraduate colleges have significant investments in the status quo, in particular the system of funding their graduate students through large general education courses. Colleges will need clear incentives to change. With these points in mind, and within the time and resource constraints it faced, the committee assessed the current general education program at WSU and came to consensus on recommendations for re envisioning the program and for the next steps in this process. Vision The goal of WSU s strategic plan is to provide a premier education and transformative experience that prepares students to excel in a global society by providing high impact 7

12 learning experiences that engage students and by fostering core competencies in our learners. Within this framework, GEVC advocates a vision of general education derived from national consensus embodied in the American Association of Colleges & Universities documents on liberal learning. So that there is no confusion about what liberal learning means, the committee uses it in the sense noted here: Reflecting the traditions of American higher education since the founding, the term liberal education headlines the kind of learning needed for a free society and for the full development of human talent. Liberal education has always been this nation s signature educational tradition, [whose] core values [are]: expanding horizons, building understanding of the wider world, honing analytical and communication skills, and fostering responsibilities beyond self (AAC&U, College Learning for the New Global Century). The vision for general education can be summarized as follows: WSU fosters educational outcomes that include knowledge of human cultures, of the arts, and of the natural and physical world. Students develop their intellectual and practical skills through integrated learning experiences that prepare them to be responsible local and global citizens and leaders. They reach this through a broad liberal education, specialization in a major, and community and field based experiences that explore the world s major questions. The outcomes of a baccalaureate degree should be reached through coordinated and integrated pathways. Courses and experiences in the major and outside the major, elective and required, contribute to students achievement of outcomes. In a framework intentionally designed to achieve outcomes, the credits required for the prescriptive elements (general education and the major) may potentially be reduced while enabling students to learn more deeply and more quickly. A nationally shared vision of liberal education becomes uniquely WSU s in the particular undergraduate outcomes established collectively by the institution, and in the design of curricular and co curricular experiences to achieve those outcomes. The re envisioning will only be complete when outcomes become embodied in curricula, and clear pathways for students through general education and major requirements emerge. 8

13 Key issues Using the guiding principles above, and building on various documents and sources, 1 the committee analyzed the WSU general education program for key issues in re thinking the program. A quick synopsis of the current program will help put the following analysis and recommendations into perspective. The analysis was conducted in the spirit of the Northwest Commission on Colleges and Universities 2009 accreditation evaluation report, which noted regarding general education: WSU has a strong general education program which now extends to its branch campuses in Vancouver and Tri Cities. Importantly, and commendably, WSU appears committed to continuously improving the general education experience and program. WSU s current model of general education After intensive study of general education models in the 1980s, WSU arrived at a compromise model of general education that embodied strengths of different models current at the time. From the notion of a core curriculum, a type in which all students follow a common set of general education courses intended to provide a common intellectual experience (as one instance, the Great Books model at such places as Chicago or St. John s), WSU developed the core World Civilizations courses that all students take upon entry. From the distribution model, intended to guarantee breadth of study outside the major, WSU developed the distributional areas which, translated by the degree audit software, have become known as alphabet soup. From the integrative model, which focuses on integration of subject areas and skills, WSU developed the discarded Areas of Coherence and the general education capstone (Tier III). Using a developmental model, the GE requirements include a transitional course as the academic backbone of the first year (World Civilizations, A requirement); they build writing into multiple levels of the curriculum; and the curriculum was originally structured in tiers intended to be of progressive intellectual sophistication. Viewing the 40 credit WSU model for its emphases, it is about 75% distributional, sandwiched by an introductory core experience (6 credits) and a culminating integrative capstone (3 credits). Leaving aside the largely discarded or ignored tier system, it is in these two places students transition in and transition out that the intentionality and coherence of the program are particularly manifested. That is, these are the two points where WSU has attempted to create learning experiences for students that are more purposeful than a purely 1 Faculty Senate 2006 report on general education; reports of the Director of General Education; 2005 Shoenberg Report; 2008 A2P2 report; the university s strategic plan; and best professional practices as exemplified by a variety of AAC&U publications, other works on general education, and the AAC&U overview of a liberal education see Appendix D. 9

14 distributional general education program. Intentionality and coherence require time and attention, which is to say, money. With money for general education in short supply, these two departures from the cafeteria model have been the points of contention about the current general education program. Put another way, the inertia and incentives of the status quo default toward the distributional model, a model that is disappearing nationally as a viable structure for developing core twenty first century skills.. Three fundamental issues Three fundamental issues must be addressed if any changes to general education requirements or courses are to have meaning and impact: 1. Budget reform is the sine qua non of general education reform The GEVC acknowledges the national reputation that the current program has achieved and sustained, but it also acknowledges that the conditions of the present and recent past severely impair the program s ability to fulfill its goals. If there is one theme pervading reports on general education over the last 10 years, whether from the Director of General Education or from the Faculty Senate, it is that General Education lacks sufficient and stable budgetary support to make it successful. Despite repeated calls for change in the funding system, nothing fundamental has been done, perhaps because of the daunting complexity of, and limited faculty power within, the current budgetary system, and perhaps because no concrete alternatives to the present system have been identified. The committee stresses that this is the make or break issue for the success of the re envisioning process. The committee does not foresee that sufficient will can be mobilized to engage in serious revamping of the program without visible commitment to, and progress on, solving this issue. The committee identified four budgetary topics for further investigation. Under resourcing: are the budgets (insofar as they can be identified) allocated to courses with GER designations disproportionately under resourced compared to those without GER designation? Put another way, of the revenue generated by GER courses, is a sufficient fraction returned to departments offering the courses to enable the instruction to meet the program goals and university strategic goals? (The current strategic goal is providing a transformative experiences that prepares students to excel in a global society through high impact learning experiences that engage students and that foster core competencies in our learners. ) These are empirical questions that a task force with support from Institutional Research and the Budget Office should 10

15 investigate so as to lay out as clearly as possible the budgetary realities before major reform is undertaken. Lack of transparency: whether the current allocations are sufficient or not, identifying them is extraordinarily difficult because they are embedded within many departmental and college budgets without separate line item status. Several undesirable consequences follow: o Without such visibility, it becomes difficult to map the impact of budget cuts on the General Education program, and whether it is disproportional to impact on majors and graduate programs. o There is no evident link between responsibilities, budgeting, and accountability for student outcomes. Neither rewards nor sanctions follow from doing general education well, or failing to do so. o WSU s matrix system of budgeting and academic responsibilities at the regional campuses complicates the task of linking responsibility, budgeting, and accountability for student outcomes. Lack of predictability: a chronic source of irritation for chairs, deans, and the Director of General Education has been the lack of a predictable mechanism to deal with enrollment increases in GER courses. The mechanism of temporary allocations (sometimes of long duration) to address enrollment issues seems to have evolved in response to years of unpredictable freshman enrollments and to the lack of periodic rebasing of budgets to account for growth (or decline). Whatever its origins, the permanent temporary money for general education courses has come to symbolize the administration s ambivalent commitment to general education. Furthermore, it creates frustration for chairs who can t make graduate offers in a timely fashion, and find it difficult to hire instructors competitively and strategically to meet student demand. The downside of making the existing temporary money permanent within the current budget system is that it then ceases to be transparent, becomes absorbed into other budgets, and can no longer be tracked for accountability nor easily mobilized for change. Leveraging current resources: Fourth, and fundamentally, the budgets supporting general education instruction are so widely distributed across the university and embedded in other budgetary structures that there is no single point or even a few 11

16 points of leverage that would allow funds to be mobilized for new endeavors. Perhaps the most formidable hurdle to changing the present system is teasing out how currently allocated resources can be shifted to support both the start up and ongoing phases of a new program. To transform student learning through the general education program, budget must be used in intentional ways to guide the implementation of a new vision of general education. A firm commitment by the central administration to adequately fund general education (including money for faculty development and faculty rewards to generate faculty buy in) is essential if any effort to re envision, or even to continue, the current program is to succeed. Such a commitment will need to be made at the beginning of a public process of general education revision, if faculty and departments are to be engaged at the needed level, and if their engagement is to be sustained over the multiple biennia that reform will take. The committee recommends that if significant new funds are not available for the first phase of implementation the budgetary task force recommended above be charged with determining how current general education monies may be identified within their budgetary matrices and mobilized for new curricula while not imperiling graduate programs. The longer term task is to tie funding to performance expectations at the unit level. 2. Awareness, buy in and marketing of General Education to faculty and students After budget, the issue identified as most fundamental to student and faculty discontent with general education is a significant general lack of understanding of the purpose and structure of the General Education Program (Senate 2006 report). The reasons for this range from shifting faculty demographics (substantial numbers educated outside US system, increasing proportion of faculty and students in professions), limited engagement of faculty with General Education teaching and advising, faculty turnover since the program was created, and lack of resources in the program for ongoing, systematic outreach. 20% of WSU faculty now hired annually on the tenure track are educated abroad, usually in systems without general education programs. WSU does not actively offer systematic information on the purposes and value of general education to new and ongoing faculty. If faculty are not familiar with the purposes of and rationale for general education, they have difficulty explaining to students its necessity and its value. General education requirements then seem to be arbitrary hoops to jump. WSU needs to create shared 12

17 understanding and agreement on the outcomes of the baccalaureate degree that include both the major and general education. Professional advisors also need regular professional development regarding the purposes and rationale for general education. Lack of understanding throughout the system affects curricular and budgetary decisions. A case in point is the institutional failure to develop a sufficient number of Tier III courses to offer students meaningful choices among schedules and subjects, and/or to achieve class sizes that allow the intended focus on research and writing. Ongoing marketing/awareness/professional development activities regarding the purposes and rationale for general education for both faculty and students must be broad, regular, and via multiple communication channels. In WSU s 2009 accreditation evaluation report from the Northwest Commission on Colleges and Universities, the critical importance of the institutional visibility of, and engagement with, general education was called out: WSU has been widely recognized for excellence in general education, but this may be difficult to sustain without broad based and committed support across the University. Second (and related), in difficult financial times it will take a deliberate and concerted focus on the value and importance of general education to the entire university to prevent the erosion of support that could jeopardize its success, to the detriment of undergraduate education and the entire University. The committee discussed several mechanisms for creating buy in and support. One is the very process of re envisioning, whose next steps should involve large numbers of faculty in working groups. A second is a system of incentives, touched on in the budget discussion above. A third is a program of ongoing faculty development, and a fourth is program descriptions in the catalog and elsewhere. The latter two received detailed discussion by the committee, summarized in Appendix B. Additional recommendations: Marketing communications resources should be applied to communicating the general education program, as it is a fundamental element of the academic program and institutional mission. Key message points about general education s purpose and value should be included in recruitment and admissions materials. 13

18 Sufficient human and financial resources for ongoing faculty development must be allocated. The Teaching Academy has played a significant role in formulating the university s learning goals as well as in faculty and TA development. Their work should be supported and extended to carry re envisioning of general education forward. 3. Shifting to an outcomes driven paradigm Changing focus from courses and content to achieving learning outcomes In keeping with new accreditation standards effective in 2010, which themselves reflect global transformations in higher education such as the outcomes based focus of the Bologna Process, WSU should turn necessity into opportunity by actively embracing the shift from courses and content to outcomes. This will not be unique to general education, but is something that must be done more generally in all programs. The new regional accreditation standards include the following: 2.C.2 The institution identifies and publishes expected course, program, and degree learning outcomes. Expected student learning outcomes for courses, wherever offered and however delivered, are provided in written form to enrolled students. 2.C.5 Faculty with teaching responsibilities take collective responsibility for fostering and assessing student achievement of clearly identified learning outcomes. 2.C.10 The institution demonstrates that the general education components of its baccalaureate degree programs (if offered) and transfer associate degree programs (if offered) have identifiable and assessable learning outcomes that are stated in relation to the institution s mission and learning outcomes for those programs. Nationally, the Association of American Colleges and Universities strongly advocates outcomesbased general education programs. The medical community, too, has recently re assessed the training of pre medical students. The report, released jointly by the Association of American Medical Colleges and the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, argues strongly for the redesign of premedical and medical school science curricula to reflect outcomes based competencies. Most separately accredited professional programs state expected outcomes, some of which are expected to come from a general education program. Any curriculum revision must start from consideration of the goals and outcomes the program is expected to achieve. Adding or deleting requirements without such a consideration can 14

19 erode the intellectual coherence of the program, and reinforce the perceived arbitrariness of the requirements. The new accreditation standard for general education from NWCCU (effective in 2010) lays the groundwork for the program s coherence: 2.C.9 The general education component of undergraduate programs (if offered) demonstrates an integrated course of study that helps students develop the breadth and depth of intellect to become more effective learners and to prepare them for a productive life of work, citizenship, and personal fulfillment. Baccalaureate degree programs and transfer associate degree programs include a recognizable core of general education that represents an integration of basic knowledge and methodology of the humanities and fine arts, mathematical and natural sciences, and social sciences. In the current system, the alphabet soup of required courses does not clearly map to particular outcomes. They are overly anchored in a few colleges, and for the most part, are not integrated with the major (except for writing in the major courses). GEVC recommends that outcomes in the first instance be specified based on what we want students to know and be able to do, independent of academic administrative and/or departmental structures. General educational outcomes are sufficiently broad that many disciplines and departments can contribute to students achieving them. Two existing courses that model intentional interdisciplinary design to achieve broad goals are World Civilizations (until 2009) and Science Depending on the final set of outcomes established for the baccalaureate, they could serve as models for other parts of the GE curriculum. But these courses, the committee hopes, are just starting points: bold new interdisciplinary Big Questions courses, intentionally designed to meet learning outcomes and students developmental needs, should emerge from followup discussions among the faculty. Recommendations: Re orient the general education and the majors to focus on assessable learning outcomes. Once the outcomes are established, curricular requirements will flow from them, and courses will then be (re)designed around them. Bring in facilitators from AAC&U and similar organizations to assist cross university faculty groups in defining assessable outcomes for broad domains in fall Clarification of learning goals and related learning outcomes The committee reviewed WSU s Six Learning Goals of the Baccalaureate in relation to the previously established learning goals of the General Education program (Appendix D). Both sets of goals line up well with those of many other institutions nationwide, and with national 15

20 research on the essential outcomes of a college education. However, there are slight differences between the Six Goals and the General Education learning goals in Pullman and Vancouver. The GEVC discussed integrating the two sets of goals into a single vision for undergraduate education, and recommends follow up work on this point through which the goals are clarified and translated into a set of specific outcomes (statements about what students will know and be able to do that are assessable). The General Education Learning Goals on p. 57 of the Catalog are a good foundation for this process, but they should not preclude consideration of additional goals and outcomes, for example regarding spatial or visual thinking, creative, or integrative thinking, or leadership. As stated in the Guiding Principles, the committee feels strongly that general educational learning outcomes should not be just a preparation for a major, but should extend throughout the entire student career at WSU, and should include the major (as, for example, the writing portion of the program already does at the upper division). Four outcomes domains require further comment. Broad disciplinary areas. Arts, humanities, social sciences, natural sciences, and so on that serve as the basis for the current required areas (B, P, H, S, etc,) and for most general education courses do not have learning outcomes established at a sufficient level of specificity so that they are assessable. The current General Education Learning Goal, Acquire knowledge in a variety of scholarly modes and contexts, and recognize diverse disciplinary viewpoints and methods is broken out into sub points that stipulate students will understand and apply the principles and methods of [e.g.] the social sciences. What these principles and methods are is not spelled out except for the use of quantitative methods to assess validity. Before the faculty can engage in a discussion of what to require, or what courses might fulfill this requirement, the outcomes students are expected to attain must first be articulated at this broad disciplinary level. Curriculum discussions then follow from the outcomes once established. Self in society. The second domain where fundamental discussion of desired outcomes must be engaged involves the current learning goal, Self in Society. Within the General Education Learning Goals it reads: Demonstrate knowledge of self in diverse cultural contexts and understand the relationship of one s own society to other societies and groups. This goal is the general rationale for the D and I requirements, and a partial one for A (World Civilizations). When we say that our strategic goal as an institution is to prepare students to excel in a global society ( Strategic Plan), and that our fundraising theme is leaders for an interconnected world, what outcomes are we positing? What knowledge and skills to this end 16

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